Exhibits,
Olivia Leigh Morris Splendor Soils
Opening: Wednesday 9 November 6-8pm Dates: Thursday 10 November - Sunday 11 December 2022
‘Splendor Soils’ explores fragments of an ancient ritual and initiation known as ‘beating the bounds’ and investigates the idea of using pain and discomfort to aid memory in the formation of mental navigational maps. In particular, the exhibition explores the act of pushing young children into stinging nettles as a way to mark space, which was often part of this ritual. The sting from the nettles would create a recollection of a place, ensuring that it was not forgotten. The ritual relied on discomfort and pain, blurring the boundaries of the self through acts of both violation and protection; a ‘festive’ inversion of painful moments with nature as the teacher.
Through photographic documentation, installation and sculpture, ‘Splendor Soils’ examines the mimicry of these performed actions and the wounds of a painful metaphorical remembering.
Olivia Leigh Morris is an artist based in Naarm (Melbourne). Her practice is a multi-faceted unearthing, mapping and metaphorical excavation of space, mindful of what she occupies. Intrinsically focusing on the horizontal and the vertical, Morris unearths a turning over of information, investigating gaps in the context of a site. Morris employs enquiry through durational works, sculpture, and site-specific intervention to unfold a spilling-over-of-boundaries and between-ness.
